


In the blink of an eye

by sdlucly



Series: Too Much [4]
Category: The OC (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Character Study, Gen, M/M, Post Episode AU
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-28
Updated: 2018-11-28
Packaged: 2019-09-01 23:07:50
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,383
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16774765
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sdlucly/pseuds/sdlucly
Summary: Originally posted February 2008, at livejournal. Betad by mylogiceatsatyou.





	In the blink of an eye

**Author's Note:**

> Originally posted February 2008, at livejournal. Betad by mylogiceatsatyou.

_November, 2006._

The professor is talking about theorems and mathematical issues that, truth be told, Seth couldn't care about less. He tries to pay attention, he does, but all he can think of is the clock ticking, the seconds going by and the thirty five minutes it should take him from the campus parking lot back home.

There's a nudge to his shoulder on his side. Seth's breath catches in his throat and the feeling has long been gone, but the memory remains. He turns around, and for a second he blinks and he's seeing blue eyes and blond hair and a smile makes its way to his lips and finds its match in R--

"Seth?"

Seth blinks, and it's Lara looking back at him, black eyes narrowed at him, dark hair framing her face. Seth swallows, gives her a tight smile. "What?" He hisses through his clenched teeth.

Lara snorts. "You either pay attention, or pay attention, because I'm not lending you my notes. Again."

Seth rolls his eyes, slouching back on the chair. His head is tilted to the side, and he's watching the professor, and he likes to think he's actually paying attention.

*****

Professor Grados ends her lecture at seven minutes past five, and Seth has felt each and every one of them. He shoves his notebook into his bag, along with both books before Lara has so much as stood up.

"In a hurry, are we? Hot date?"

Seth doesn't dignify that with a response, only glances over his shoulder at her. He could explain, he thinks. He could explain to her and Luigi and Jennifer, but he's only known them two months, and he knows what they will say, how they will look at him. He hates those looks.

She blinks and before he can think of something to say, she frowns. "Are you going home for the weekend, again?"

"There's that paper in American writing due next week, right? I'll probably get it started tomorrow."

"Seth--"

He throws the bag over his head, letting it fall across his chest, before turning around. "I'll see you on messenger," he yells over his shoulder.

He's out the door and rushing down the hallway even as he hears her call out his name. He doesn't turn around.

*****

It's Friday, and there's nothing Seth hates more than rush hour when he wishes he could do sixty on the freeway. It takes him a little over an hour to finally find his way home, turning right at the corner and down the street. He parks the car on the driveway, kills the engine.

He's been rushing to get to this point, he always is, and the moment the rumble of the engine dies and he's left with nothing but silence and his thoughts, it feels as if something's leaving him. The memory, he thinks for a fleeting moment, the memory, but then he blinks and he remembers the words and the smile and the lift of an eyebrow and everything fits and it's right and

\-- his throat is tight and he remembers, oh, he remembers, his smile and the way he looked up at him with wide blue eyes and said _Seth_ , like a whisper, like a blessing, how it was the last word he had uttered before closing his eyes and shuddering in his arms and--

he gasps.

Seth lifts his face from his hands, where it had hidden in between his palms, against the steering wheel. He turns to look at the window, at the light coming from the dining room. Freshmen year is taking him away from Ryan, every day, a little bit more. But he's not letting it. He won't let it.

Ryan's probably starting dinner. His mom is feeding it to him and if Ryan's having a good day, then he's smiling, blended dinner dripping from the corner of his lips onto his chin. If he's having a bad day, if it's a bad day--

Seth pushes the door open, reaching for the bag in the passenger seat. He slides it over one shoulder, keys in hand, taking out his two bags from the trunk. His dad opens the door as he's making his way up the path.

"Son," his dad says, small smile on his face.

Seth can read the tiredness in the lines of his dad's face, in the new wrinkles around the eyes and on his forehead. He smiles, feeling tired himself, and his dad hugs him tight, holds on a little longer than usual.

Seth breathes in, the smell of sweat and food on Sandy's clothes, on Sandy's very skin. When they pull away, Seth wants to ask how he's doing, but doesn't. He'll see for himself in a minute.

Sandy takes one of the bags from Seth, and Seth lets him.

"How was school?"

Seth shrugs, doesn't answer. There isn't an answer. School was school. He went to class, copied down what was strictly necessary, did the two papers he had to finish. Nothing to tell.

He walks through the front door, takes the left leading to the dinning room and the kitchen, and he sees them in a minute. His mom is sitting in her usual chair, hair pulled back in a low pony tail, jeans and sweatshirt that he still doesn't get used to seeing her wear. She has Ryan's plate in her hands, which is almost full.

And Ryan, Ryan's sitting in his chair, head turned away from the spoonful of pureed food, away from his mother and toward him. Ryan grunts, making a sound deep in his throat that could almost be a word, and Seth feels something in his chest crack under pressure, snap and loosen, and he breathes.

" _Ryan_ ," Seth says, his voice low, and Ryan turns his upper body toward him, reaching out. Seth can see Ryan's left hand flopping on his lap like a fish out of water, and his chest cracks again, and this time it doesn't loosen but tightens. Ryan's right hand doesn't even move.

He hears his mom sigh tiredly and exasperated, and then Seth's crossing the space in two steps, hearing the bags fall from slack fingers.

Kirsten places the bowl back on the table, the spoon on the tablemat. She pinches the bridge of her nose in between her thumb and her middle finger, a gesture she's had for years now. 

She doesn't groan, so the day hasn't been that bad.

"Kiddo," Seth says, in a voice that's not his own, and Ryan grunts again, flops his head back to the headrest of the chair, as if it weighs too much. Seth closes his eyes for a fleeting moment. His hand moves to the side of Ryan's face, his other one to keep him balanced on the edge of the chair as he crouches down.

He smiles at Ryan, a smile he feels down to his stomach, to the coldness in his chest that reappears from time to time, like the caress of a lover he had thought he had long gotten over. He swallows, and the smile stays on his lips, and Ryan leans into his touch, closes his eyes and sighs.

"He's been cranky all day."

Seth hears his mother's voice from his left. He squeezes his fingers over Ryan's jaw before turning to look at her over his shoulder. He glances at her, then toward the kitchen, where his dad is serving him dinner. He turns back to Ryan, smiles at him, watching Ryan blink but not open his eyes.

"He's tired," Seth says, looking at his mom.

Kirsten nods. "He got tired pretty quickly at PT. I don't know why. Andrea checked him over, said he was fine." She looks down at the bowl before her, and Seth notices that it's almost full. "He hasn't eaten."

"We could take him to bed early." Seth stands up, his knees complaining at the movement, but his hand stays on Ryan's cheek, Ryan moving with it. He smiles, soft around the edges. "He's almost asleep here."

Kirsten shakes her head, and his dad makes his way by Ryan's side before going around the table, ruffling Ryan's hair as he does so. Ryan half follows Sandy's hand before sighing, and it's the sound of a plate on the table that makes him look up, at his dad taking his seat back at the table.

"Another hour," Sandy says, turning to look at Ryan. He sighs. "Another one, two if he can handle it, then off to bed."

Seth nods, because he knows Ryan has a routine for a reason. Ryan might be tired and cranky, but if he goes to bed this early, not even six thirty, he'll be awake in ten hours and bored and even crankier because there's no one awake to entertain him.

Seth pats Ryan's other cheek with his free hand, and after a moment Ryan blinks and has enough strength in him to turn his head around and look right at Seth. Right at Seth, like he's heard every word they have said about him, right at Seth as if he wants to snort and shake his head, and tell Seth that he's not tired, he's just biding his time until he can kick Seth's ass in the game of Seth's choice.

Seth swallows, leans forward to place a kiss on Ryan's forehead. He places Ryan's head back against the headrest, and when he takes the seat on Ryan's right, Ryan follows Seth with his eyes, knowingly. Seth sits down, picks up his fork and knife and takes a bite out of the chicken casserole. 

Ryan grunts again and Seth smiles, big grin on his face because he'll take his wins where he can get them. He hears his mom laugh low in her throat, and sees the small smile on his father's lips.

"You wanna hear about my week at school?"

Ryan has his eyes wide open, his lips parted. The right side of his mouth is tipped down a little, something that comes from tiredness and sleep around the corner of his eyes, but his eyes are blue and wide and open and happy, and he doesn't nod, but Seth can almost see him do it. Ryan opens his mouth wider, in an almost smile, and he says a word that sounds like Seth's name, or at least it does to Seth's ears.

Seth grins, and nods, and starts talking about the two papers he had to give in, about the test that murdered the whole class on Tuesday, and in between, about how he misses Ryan like a physical force. If Ryan gives him the ghost of a smile so much like the ones Seth remembers from a lifetime ago, and something inside him snaps and loosens, and his voice halts, Seth pretends not to notice.

*****

There's Ice Age 2 playing on the TV, but the truth is neither of them is really watching it.

Seth looks down at Ryan, finger pushing a lock of hair behind his ear, caressing the contour of Ryan's cheekbone, the line of his jaw. Ryan's breathing is even, barely even a shift in his sleep, and yet his left hand stays on Ryan's shoulder, holding, just in case Ryan were to move. Seth has learned his lesson, the hard way.

The house around them is quiet, and for a moment Seth thinks he can hear the sound of the ocean hitting the shore, nothing but a memory, the feeling long gone. This house ends in a big backyard that's green instead of blue, grass high because his dad keeps forgetting to mown it.

This house, he thinks. This house, with its living room filled with the furniture of the den, with the kitchen table in the dining room, with the empty place in the corner seat for Ryan's wheelchair. This house, he thinks, this house that fits like Newport never did. Newport always felt like too small skin over their bodies, and now, finally, they can move freely.

He thinks about his parents, or at least tries very hard not to think about them. It's only a little before eight, and saying they were turning in early sounds funny and not at all cryptic enough, but he knows caring for Ryan 24/7 takes its toll on a person. His mom has more lines around her eyes, lines she didn't have last year, let alone three years ago. She looks older, all her thirty nine years old.

He sighs, leaning his head back, eyes wide open. He can feel the tension in his right shoulder, in the way the muscle pulls and aches, in the tightness in the back of his neck, between his eyes. It's only November, and yet it feels like a lifetime of living in a small dorm room and going to classes he can't quite find it in himself to care about. It's high school all over again. It's being more worried about how Ryan is than what he's supposed to be learning.

And that might have been one of the main reasons they moved here, found this home. But it wasn't the only one. They should have done it so long ago. Now, thinking back, Seth can't understand why they didn't. Why, after that day in January, after the weeks in the hospital. Why hadn't they just picked up everything and left, instead of pretending for over two years that Newport was still their home?

Then again, hindsight is always twenty twenty, right? It doesn't matter. It doesn't even matter how disorganized and random his thoughts are, it doesn't matter at a--

Ryan shifts under his hand, and Seth looks down at him, Ryan not quite moving, grimace on his face. He sighs, smoothing down the lines in between Ryan's eyes with a fingertip, and Ryan sighs against Seth's skin.

He'll let Ryan sleep for another couple of minutes, then see if Ryan's ready to go to bed. If not, if Ryan would rather stay here and maybe try to finish watching Manny convince Ellie that she actually is a Mammoth, then they can always do that.

Seth shifts on the couch, slouching a little further down, right hand in Ryan's hair. Ten more minutes, then he'll wake Ryan up.


End file.
